iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Stefan Gagne

🚨 12 HOURS REMAIN 🚨 Become a backer of Amnesia Fortnight: Indie Reboot to get cool swag, play game jam prototypes, vote on your favorite project, and support our indie studio. Head to Kickstarter to join the campaign, but act fast, it ends TODAY! kck.st/4gu8zAF

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 16h

Batomon Showdown... how dare you. Ohhh, how dare you. You evil sons of bitches. How dare. It's so good. It's so FUN. I barely understand what I'm doing and I'm still loving it. You horrible, sadistic maniacs. I'm gonna lose hours to do this. It's so perfect to poke at while listening to stuff.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 23h

Me: OK, I only have a week in this game event for fallout to get the one weapon I'm actually looking for, and you only get one shot every hour. I hate grinding but I guess here we go Fallout: it's in the second bag I'm giving you, you're done now Me: Well, then! More time for writing.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 28/09/2026

I've had the song "The Politics of Dancing" stuck in my head all day but it sounds more like "The Politics of Danzig" and now I'm wondering what Glenn Danzig's politics are (one wikipedia check later) yeah okay meh right-leaning centrist doofus nevermind

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 28/09/2026

Finally getting the nerve back up to resume playing control. Watch the YouTube play through because I was stuck in an endless tunnel loop, turns out I missed a giant sign with an arrow on it that essentially says "this way, dumbass." no clue how I didn't spot it.

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Fiction Factory Games @fictionfactorygames.com · 28/09/2026

Meet Detective Inque Wells, your literature teacher. Two fists of cold justice, half a bottle of bathtub moonshine, and They/Them pronouns. Respect 'em or yours become Was/Were. The Edutainment Vortex Diner releases Dec 7 for free on PC. store.steampowered.com/app/4993020/...

Picture of an individual in a trenchcoat and hat, sitting in a diner decorated like a film noir detective's office. Text reads: My name, at least as I'd like to remember it, was Detective Inque Wells. An oozing, stained name for an oozing, stained soul.

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Kelly @broadwaybabyto.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

People aren’t faking their disabilities, they’re faking being well. We know society hates us. We know we will be judged for using assistive devices. Many of us take years to get the courage to lean in to accommodations. Stop judging. Help us build a more inclusive world.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 27/09/2026

Here's my current complete Lego collection. Started building and curating this year, wrapping up with a lot of really lovely sets on display. Until they announce something that I feel would fit in with all this (or I pay hoarder prices for retired sets) it's pretty much good to go.

Lego sets for Shopping Street, Central Station, airport, the bridge of the enterprise, a Nintendo entertainment system, a Polaroid camera, a normal shutter camera, a retro phone, the DeLorean for back to the future, a hot rod, a french fry truck, and a burger truck.

Lego sets for the smart play Star Wars X wing, Nintendo game boy, an arcade machine modified to look like a neo Geo, and figurines that look like my characters Naomi and Penny.

Lego arcade cabinets for donkey Kong and Pac-Man.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 27/09/2026

After ten hours of noodling around and wasting time I finally sit down to write and... now I need to go to sleep. I feel like I'm always running out of time, but rarely utilize what I have available to me. What happens when I'm too old and tired to write? Piles of regret over procrastinated hours?

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 26/09/2026

Now that the Amnesia Fortnight demos are out and I've played them, I can back up what I said here. Plot Armor has the most long-term value, Uprise is the best candidate for a quick one month turnaround. (Although I was having some issues timing the attacks in that game, it is SO pretty and cozy.)

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Joshua Saxon @saxonaudio.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

It’s not that you’re using em-dashes, it’s not that you’re using negation, it’s not that you’re using anything in a patterned way. It’s that you’re using software built on the theft of others’ copyrighted works. It is not, nor will it ever be a creative process. This matters.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 26/09/2026

I am really struggling with Control Resonant. I can't finish a quest because I'm getting lost in these tunnels and can't figure out where I'm supposed to go next, I'm getting motion sickness from the camera swinging around so much, and I can't track 96 glowing things on a pitch black screen at once.

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

SEGA SATURN, SHIRO! @segasaturnshiro.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Is there any harm in using AI to work on — or entirely create — projects for the Sega Saturn and elsewhere in the retro gaming scene? Yes, PandaMonium says in this opinion column, equating such work to digital asbestos: www.segasaturnshiro.com/2026/09/24/c... #sega #saturn #segasaturn #retrogaming

segasaturnshiro.com

Column: All A.I. Projects Are Digital Asbestos

The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent the views of all SHIRO! Media Group contributors. The cost of modern day video game consoles and personal computers have skyrocketed…

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 24/09/2026

Control Resonant: Hey uh buddy do you need the popup tutorial on what button to push to dodge again Me: No, I just have the reflexes of a 51 year old disabled guy Control Resonant: Y'want assist mode on? It's cool, we won't take away cheevos Me: Yep thanks I appreciate you not judging me

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 24/09/2026

Steam desperately wants to replace Discord and even Twitch, offering chat, forums, streaming, everything. But like... why? The forums are toxic unmoderated rivers of culture warrior sludge, and curators seem to only exist to scam me for game keys. Clean your house if you want me to live there.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 24/09/2026

Amnesia Fortnight demos! Bearing in mind this is MY take, and not a judgment? Bard Crawl makes me motion sick and is clearly for wacky friendslop-loving pals, which I lack, so sadly no. Architactics is really fascinating but RTS and city management are not really my genres. The last two, though...

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Ryan North @ryannorth.ca · 23/09/2026

Pompeii is a UNESCO world heritage site not because it was remarkable in its prime, but because it survived to our era untouched: one moment, preserved for all time. But future generations won't know what OUR world was like unless we do the same. This is why we MUST bury Toronto with a volcano

Picture of the streets of Pompeii, from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pompei_-_panoramio_(26).jpg. Taken by Tanya Dedyukhina, used under CC

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 23/09/2026

I've bought exactly three full-price AAA games in the last three years. Two are WWE (not really proud of that) but the third is Control Resonant. I've been following Remedy since they were Future Crew in the 90s. I don't know who keeps giving them money to make gonzo games but I reap the reward.

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

✪ Gray Skies Ahead ✪ @jongraywb.blacksky.app · 23/09/2026

Honestly, this kinda sounds like what this whole September has felt like.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 23/09/2026

Is it weird that I feel like I need to re-train myself to watch TV and movies? Like, just WATCH. Not get distracted every few minutes and go poke an app, not leave it on in the background while I work, just focus and enjoy the story and cinematography and stuff. I feel like I'm very scatterbrained.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 22/09/2026

Do you remember The twenty first night of DAMMIT i'm three minutes too late oh well try again next year

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Fiction Factory Games @fictionfactorygames.com · 21/09/2026

The Great Zephyr is here to teach you math and perform magical wonders! Get ready to be dazzled by algorithms, AI, and cryptocurrency. ...she DOES specialize in trickery, but who's the real mark? The Edutainment Vortex Diner debuts Dec 7th for free on PC. store.steampowered.com/app/4993020/...

Screenshot of Zephyr, a woman wearing a stage magician's costume complete with top hat. Her version of the diner looks like a casino. Dialogue reads: I'm here to dazzle you with my mathemagic tricks... and give you a peek behind the curtain so you can learn them, too!

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 21/09/2026

Got the first writing done on the new game. Like actual writing, in a game script, not just design document stuff. Does anybody else work like this? Just cooking away in the back of your head for days, maybe jotting down notes, but not actually diving to write it until the moment hits you?

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Steven (with a PH) @sjksalisbury.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

Christening a baby is nothing like christening a ship. I know that now. Once again I can only apologise.

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

LoadingReadyRun @loadingreadyrun.com · 20/09/2026

Let’s all just celebrate a very old, very goofy holiday, and all agree to ignore that this video now displays as “20y ago” on YouTube. Thank you. Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day. 🏴‍☠️ youtu.be/RzkQC0e91Nc

youtu.be

How to Talk like a Pirate

YouTube video by LoadingReadyRun

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Valentine 🏳️‍⚧️🇵🇷🐇 @bunnybelmont.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

please ignore this game, suda and james gunn are not involved, it’s an AI game (confirmed) from a company that loves AI play an actual suda game on steam right now called KILLER7, which is one of the best games ever made also no more heroes and the silver case and killer is dead, just to name more

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Will Quinn @willquinnart.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Daily bunny no.3446 is not left-handed

Bunnies re-enact the duel between Inigo and Wesley in "The Princess Bride", with a masked bunny fighting against a dashing shaggy bunny with a gold sword. The masked bunny is cornered, near the edge of a rocky cliffside, but still has a trick up his sleeve

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 18/09/2026

Marketing Dork: "You'll never reach anyone unless you start a TikTok, loser" Me: "OK, I guess here's me making a cute vulnerable face from cute angles with a ChatGPT-written inspirational caption quote and a trending song playing in the background for ten seconds" Internet: "HAVE ALL THE MONEY"

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

LGR @lgr-yt.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Probably the best Windows 9x defrag simulation I've seen thus far! defrag98.com It's a more legit simulation than I've seen before. So each time you load this up you get a new virtual drive that's differently fragmented, rather than just playing back a preset animation

defrag98.com

Windows 98 Disk Defrag Simulator

The classic Windows 98 Disk Defragmenter, free in your browser. Pick a drive, cue the HDD sounds, and relive 1998.

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

austinbroth.bsky.social @austinbroth.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

You can put regular sized shoes on Sora in Fortnite and it looks insane

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Fiction Factory Games @fictionfactorygames.com · 17/09/2026

Arcade Spirits and The New Challengers are both on sale on Steam for TWO FREAKING DOLLARS each?! You could buy one large bag of Chex Mix or two amazing video games that'll give you hours of fun! Look, I like Chex Mix, but the decision here is obvious. store.steampowered.com/app/910630/A...

store.steampowered.com

Save 90% on Arcade Spirits on Steam

Arcade Spirits is a romantic visual novel that follows an alternative timeline where the 1983 video game crash never occurred. It's 20XX and you've just started a new job at the Funplex game arcade. W...

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 16/09/2026

It's bullshit and indirect marketing, but if it convinces the normies to stay the fuck away from ChatGPT... sure, let's say it's Skynet. If all people can understand it is slowly trending chrome skeleton men because climate change is too lefty of a concept, then da da da, da dum ahl be bahk

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 16/09/2026

If you want to see a complete swath of PC game pixel art approaches, tune into this. We're talking Commodore wide pixels, EGA, VGA, SVGA, all the good stuff. Took a lot of inspiration from this artwork for my new project, The Edutainment Vortex Diner. The name was also inspired by retro pals too!

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 16/09/2026

One of these days we're going to get AAA game that's just squeezing through narrow places while characters talk to each other. Just hours and hours of that. That'll be $80 please

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 14/09/2026

Me, looking through program code for a project I'd abandoned early this year and am now trying to revive:

static.klipy.com

Gandalf: I Have No Memory Of This Place

Alt: Gandalf: I Have No Memory Of This Place

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

Fiction Factory Games @fictionfactorygames.com · 14/09/2026

Omegus Septum, honored Knowledge-Aspect of the Ixian Empire, is here to teach you the terrible wonders of SCIENCE! And how to kneel to an authoritarian empire. Learn science and/or be destroyed. The Edutainment Vortex Diner launches Dec 7th for free on PC. store.steampowered.com/app/4993020/...

A techno space warlord with a holy book preaches in a diner. "Hear me now, Cadet-Aspirant! know that it is the year 400,000 of the Greater ixian Empire. four hundred millenia of glory!"

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 14/09/2026

Body: hey Me: g'way im sleepin Body: OK but what if I woke you up after 5h30m and had you to go to the bathroom four times in a row and then you're too awake to sleep again and I destroy you with exhaustion later in the day right when you want to actually do something Me: haet you Body: ;-)

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 13/09/2026

A narrative game design problem for the ages: providing player agency to accept or reject another character when you really don't have a good reason to reject them other than like an achievement or something. Do you just write the story so that you always accept them? That feels railroading.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 12/09/2026

New StarCraft announced in this foul year of our lord 2026 (actually coming in 2030) feels very weird. The 25 year gap allowed Warhammer to take back the crown from its knockoff copy. It's hard to think of "dark future war" with these three factions archetypes without thinking "oh, so Warhammer."

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Reposted by Stefan Gagne

dani dee⁷ @ writing trash women @epistellar.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Stunting early childhood brain development to cater to the sad beige moms What stage of capitalism is this

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 12/09/2026

Pretty low energy today, but I did manage to do what I said I needed to do: crack into the design document and figure some stuff out. There's more to do, and I really wanna nail this down before I start contracting artwork like last time. Timing is everything.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 11/09/2026

Imagine a really funny viral video here where someone's playing Super Mario Brothers 1 with blue scent trails and echolocation of hidden items and vocals of "Mamma Mia, where is the princess?!" Imagine I made that. Just pretend I had the skills to make that. Please give me all your Internet money

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 11/09/2026

I need to seriously sit down and crank on this design doc. I have so much in my head, I'm feeling who these characters are and what their voices are like. Where they're going to come into conflict. But I need to actually get it down. Not sure why I'm hesitating. Anxiety? Worrying it's too soon?

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Liam @jazzyfuture.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

The message included with this proto dump is rad

Today, I’m releasing the SNES proof-of-concept alpha of Project Dream, the proto-type that would go on to become Banjo-Kazooie.

I’ve held on to this for years, it was fun to have something that only a handful of people had, and as I am several people removed from how it got out of Rare to begin with, I didn’t want to risk that it could somehow get someone else in trouble, (so how I got it is a story I don’t plan to share.) I will just say that I got it from someone who got it from someone, who got it from somewhere.

But with the current state of the industry and Microsoft's current heartless gutting and mismanagement of Rare and other companies it controls, plus with how long it's been, I feel it's more important to make sure this is properly preserved, and the ROM dissected by people with far more knowledge on how to do such things.

I hope by releasing this, that it also inspires other people to release what they have as well. I know the Twelve Tales Conker 64 prototype is out there somewhere, but sadly, this is the only thing that I have.

There is little joy left in the industry, as it relentlessly marches towards AI, layoffs, l anti-preservation and ownership tactics, and, in Microsoft’s case, the support and approval of literal genocide in Gaza.

Let’s get the last beautiful things hiding on our hard drives out there for everyone. That's all we have left.

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 09/09/2026

Me: I really need to hammer down the worldbuilding on my next game, like is it going to be Faerie Court focused, or governmental collapse focused, or corporate or Also Me: You just had your flu and covid boosters and feel like you've been hit by a truck please stop brainstorming it hurts to think

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Double Fine @doublefine.com · 09/09/2026

Today our top 4 Amnesia Fortnight projects move to the prototype phase: 🍻 Bard Crawl 📖 Plot Armor 🪁 Uprise 🏬 Architactics We'll be LIVE today @ ~2:00pm to discuss. Join the fun! twitch.tv/doublefine Back the Kickstarter to vote for the winner:

dfaf2026.com

Amnesia Fortnight 2026, Indie Reboot

A Double Fine Productions Game Jam, Documentary, and Kickstarter Campaign

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Graham Stark @graham.loadingreadyrun.com · 08/09/2026

If Werner Herzog (rightly) said this to me, I would simply crawl into a hole and die. (also, gonna adopt “Go ahead and fail” when dealing with AI bros)

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Stefan Gagne @stefangagne.com · 08/09/2026

A very topsy-turvy day with my schedule completely out of whack, including a doctors appointment! I hate days like this. At least I'm smooth sailing after this for a while. I've been trying to work on the game design document but it's hard to get the creative juice going to amidst chaos.

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